The pitch-black night - Fright Night

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Movie
German title The pitch-black night - Fright Night
Original title Fright Night
Fright Night logo.jpg
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1985
length 103 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Tom Holland
script Tom Holland
production Herb Jaffe
music Brad Fiedel
camera Jan Kiesser
cut Kent Beyda
occupation

The raven black night - Fright Night (Original title: Fright Night ) is an American horror comedy directed by Tom Holland from 1985.

action

Charly Brewster is in bed with his girlfriend Amy while Peter Vincent's Fright Night Show is on TV. Charly sees two men carrying a coffin into the neighboring house. Amy notices that she is completely ignored by Charly and goes home indignant.

The next day, Charly sees a blonde prostitute going into the neighboring house. A day later, Charly tries to reconcile with Amy, but is then distracted by a news program that says the blonde was found dead. When Amy notices that Charly does not notice her, she gets angry again and leaves.

At night Charly observes his new neighbor Mr. Dandrige making love with a beautiful red-haired woman in the neighboring house and notices that Dandrige has fangs. Charly now decides to go to the police. He tells a police officer that Mr. Dandrige is the killer. When the policeman doesn't believe Charly, he describes his observation, which has the result that the policeman thinks he is crazy. Charly tells the story to his schoolmate Ed. After a battle of words, Ed tells what he knows about vampires, for example that a vampire can only enter a house if he is wanted. Charly's mother invites Mr. Dandrige and tells him that he can come back anytime. Dandrige comes at night to kill Charly. Dandrige offers to let him live if he stops spying on him. But Charly rams a pencil into his hand. Now Dandrige shows his true colors and transforms. Charly is saved at the last second when his mother wakes up and Dandrige runs away.

Charly decides that the recently released Peter Vincent is his last hope and wants to get him to help. When Charly tells him the vampire story, Peter first thinks that Charly wants to cheer him up. But then he realizes that Charly is serious and thinks he's crazy too. Amy and Ed are worried about Charly and visit him. Amy and Ed pretend to believe Charly, but think that he is now completely insane. They persuade Peter Vincent to go to Dandrige's apartment with them and Charly to convince Charly that he is not a vampire.

In the evening they go to Dandrige's house and test him with holy water. Dandrige passes the holy water test because it was actually just plain tap water. But Peters then realizes in his cigarette case (which contains a mirror) that Dandrige has no reflection, whereupon the case falls on the floor and he now urges the others to leave the house with him. Charly, Amy and Ed go home in the fog. Ed takes a short cut down a narrow alley until he notices that he is being followed by Dandrige. After a short escape, he is bitten by Dandrige. Peter has now holed up in his apartment. Suddenly Ed knocks on the door, who says that he is being followed by Dandrige. Peter lets him in and discovers with horror that Ed is a vampire. Ed attacks Peter, but he can save himself and puts a cross on Ed's forehead, which injures him. Ed flees and swears vengeance.

Amy and Charly flee from Dandrige to a disco. Amy is suddenly attracted to Dandrige as if hypnotized and kidnapped by him. At the same time, Dandrige creates a mass panic. Charly is asked to come to Dandrige's apartment with Peter Vincent. Charly can fend off Mr. Dandrige with a cross, but his human roommate Billy Cole overwhelms him. Peter runs out of the house and looks for his mother in Charly's house. He finds Ed in her bed, who transforms into a wolf and goes after Peter. Finally, Peter manages to stake Ed with a piece of the banister.

Charly has since noticed that the dazed Amy is a vampire. Peter comes up and says that if they kill Dandrige before dawn they can save Amy. First Billy Cole tries to stop her. Peter shoots him, but Billy gets up again after being bitten by Mr. Dandrige. Peter shoots him a few more times without being able to stop him, but then Charly rams a wooden stake into Billy's heart, whereupon Billy dies. Suddenly Dandrige appears, who now finally wants to finish off Charly and Vincent. He doesn't notice that the sun is rising behind him. A ray of sun penetrates through a broken pane behind him and he catches fire. He now has to get back into his coffin as quickly as possible, but Charly and Vincent stand in his way. Dandrige takes the form of a bat and flees into his coffin. Peter and Charly go into the cellar to find the coffin. Amy appears and pounces on Charly in vampire form. Peter can now almost stop Dandrige by breaking the black-painted windows in the room to let in the sunlight. Dandrige manages to flee into the still dark corner where his coffin is, until Charly manages to reveal the window hung there. The rays of the sun hit Dandrige and cause it to crumble into dust.

Again Charly and Amy are in bed and again Peter Vincent's Fright Night Show is on , but this time with aliens instead of vampires. Suddenly, Charly seems to see something fleetingly in a window of the neighboring house. At first he stares over, but changes his mind when Amy asks if everything is okay, turns away from the window and goes back to bed with Amy.

Two glowing eyes can be seen in the neighboring house and you can hear Ed's crazy laugh.

Reviews

Roger Ebert wrote in the Chicago Sun-Times of August 2, 1985 that the first half of the film was funny, the second half contained “spectacular special effects”. The film is not "excellent", but offers a lot of fun.

The lexicon of international films wrote that the film was a "modern variation of the ' Dracula ' material" and a "parodic horror film with many garish horror and shock effects."

Variety wrote: "Director Tom Holland keeps his film nice and simple and completely believable (one first accepts the existence of vampires)."

Janet Maslin said in the New York Times , "The tone is never comedic and the horror accents are more disgusting than creepy."

Time Out London noted: "Strange that the film works at all - but it does" and also highlighted the music by Brad Fiedel .

Mike Bracken was reminiscent of American Werewolf (D: John Landis, 1981), and seemed to have seen a dichotomy over time (“second act”, “second half”). He also points out the sexual and especially homoerotic subtext (“there's actually some subtext here”).

The TV guide to it: “A small classic of the genre”.

Awards

The film won in 1986 three Saturn Awards for best horror film , the best script and Roddy McDowall as best supporting actor . He also received nominations for Best Director , Best Special Effects and Chris Sarandon for Best Actor . Tom Holland won a prize at the Fantasporto film festival in 1986 and was nominated for another prize at that festival.

background

The film was shot in Los Angeles . Its production amounted to an estimated 9 million US dollars . The film grossed approximately $ 24.9 million in US cinemas.

Richard Edlund was involved in the special effects ( “ visual effects producer ” ).

McDowall's role name, Peter Vincent, was intended as a tribute to two icons of classic horror films, Peter Cushing and Vincent Price . McDowall had a long-standing personal friendship with Price. A trace of Christopher Lee is also included, according to Roger Ebert.

Sequel and remake

In 1988, the sequel My Neighbor the Vampire (D: Tommy Lee Wallace ) was released, in which Roddy McDowall again played the role of Peter Vincent .

A remake with Anton Yelchin , Colin Farrell , Christopher Mintz-Plasse and David Tennant in the leading roles was released in 2011 with the title Fright Night .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Review by Roger Ebert, accessed June 14, 2007
  2. ↑ Die ravenenschwarze Nacht - Fright Night in the Lexicon of International Films,Template: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used accessed on June 14, 2007
  3. ^ Variety Staff: Fright Night. In: Variety . January 1, 1985, accessed on August 21, 2008 (English): "Director Tom Holland keeps the picture wonderfully simple and entirely believable (once the existence of vampires is accepted, of course)"
  4. ↑ Janet Maslin : Fright Night (1985). In: The New York Times . August 2, 1985, accessed on August 21, 2008 : "But its tone is never exactly comedic and its horrific touches are more disgusting than scary"
  5. ↑ NGOs: Fright Night (1985). (No longer available online.) In: Time Out London. Archived from the original on November 29, 2009 ; accessed on August 21, 2008 . Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.timeout.com
  6. ↑ see web links.
  7. ↑ Fright Night. In: TV Guide . www.tvguide.com, accessed on August 21, 2008 (English): "A minor classic of the genre"
  8. ^ Filming locations for Fright Night, accessed June 14, 2007
  9. ↑ Box office / business for Fright Night, accessed June 14, 2007
  10. ^ Full cast and crew for Fright Night, accessed August 21, 2008